“I’ll Try Heroin Once,” I said, but it Turned Into an 18-year Addiction
A story of a child turned addict and an addict turned doctor
Warning: The language in this article may trigger anyone who has ever struggled with opiates.
Sitting at the back of the bus, I’m both excited and afraid. Am I going to die from a heroin overdose? Or am I going to have the best night of my life? I was the one who insisted we should try heroin, so I can’t back out now.
As we joked around on the bus — five skinny teenagers — we tried to hide the fact that we were all scared shitless. We talked about everything except what we were about to do, but every now and then it crept into conversation, and the mood shifted from jovial to a dark silence.
We were on our way to meet my friend Cian. He had done it many times before, so all we had to do was go with the flow. When we arrived at his house, he invited us in. The furniture in his sitting room reminded me of my nan’s house — good quality, but it had seen its fair share of visitors.
There was a nervous, giddy atmosphere in the room. Cian didn’t waste any time. He walked into the kitchen and came back with a roll of aluminium foil, a pair of scissors, and some toilet paper. Then he took five bags of heroin from his pocket and…
